Judging a company by its name
Are grandiose names a reflection of ambition or an indication of hubris, a sign of future success or impending doom?An assessment using machine learning.
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WHEN S-chip Celestial Nutrifoods went into liquidation 10 years ago, it was far from heavenly for minority shareholders. Another S-chip, Midas, turned out to be less than golden. Homegrown Best World has not had the best of times. Meanwhile, a more modestly named Apple became the most valuable company in the world. Tencent in China turned out to be worth a lot more than its name.
Does the name of a company matter? We were intrigued by the rather grandiose words frequently appearing in names of companies, often combined with other grandiose words. Are grandiose names a reflection of ambition or an indication of hubris or window-dressing? Is a grandiose name a sign of future success or impending doom?
Anecdotally, we had noticed that companies that got into trouble often seem to have rather grandiose names.
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